Mr. Monk Gets on Board (17 page)

“I’m sixty-four percent sure it wasn’t,” Monk told the Sheffields.

Sylvia frowned. “Wasn’t what? Wasn’t vandalism or wasn’t an accident?”

“Sixty-four percent that it wasn’t an accident. And seventy percent that it wasn’t part of the vandalism spree.”

“Percent?” said the captain, tilting his head. “We ask your opinion and you’re answering us in percentages?”

“Yes, I am. A hundred percent answering you in percentages. It’s sixty-four.”

“That’s just the way he talks,” I said. “There’s a better than even chance this was murder.”

“Murder?” Sylvia gasped. “Who would want to kill one of our passengers? Do you think it might be drug related or a robbery? After all, this is Mexico.”

“That’s a ten-percent chance,” said Monk. “Six percent for drugs and four percent for robbery.”

“Are you just making this up?” asked the captain. “You’re making this up.”

In a way he was; in a way he wasn’t. The numbers weren’t exact but they weren’t arbitrary, either. It was Monk’s way of keeping all the possibilities open but keeping them in perspective. Don’t ask me how it works.

“I’m a hundred percent sure I’m not making it up.” Okay, now Monk was just being contrary.

“Fine,” said the captain. “So, you’re saying the odds are it wasn’t an accident and the odds are it’s not related to the things on the ship.”

“Sixty-four and seventy percent respectively,” Monk repeated.

“Do you know what happened at all?” asked Sylvia who was fifty percent confused and fifty percent frustrated.

“Not exactly,” said Monk.

“But he’s a hundred percent sure how Mariah Linkletter died.” That was me. I couldn’t resist throwing it in.

“Of course,” said Sheffield’s wife. “It was an accident.”

Monk corrected me. “Actually, I’m at ninety-six percent, not a hundred.”

Captain Sheffield sighed and threw up his hands. “Just tell me, Mr. Monk. What are the odds of you earning your money and getting to the bottom of this?”

“One hundred percent,” said Monk.

“A hundred-percent guarantee,” I agreed.

I wasn’t quite sure what any of that meant, but we wound up with a great exit line. With those words ringing in their ears, Monk and I turned on our heels and haughtily walked away, Monk still clutching his two bags of Spam and me with my bag of wine.

   CH
APTER TWENTY-ONE

Mr. Monk’s Missing Leg

W
e were among the last passengers to reboard the
Golden Sun
. There were still a few supplies on the dock to be loaded up the gangway, but I purposely didn’t look. The last thing I needed was to make myself guess which box was holding the corpse of Malcolm Leeds.

It was pirate night, a realization I came to as soon as we stepped into the shipboard throng. The sound system was blaring some yo-ho-ho tune, probably from a Disney movie.

I don’t know why cruise ships feel compelled to hold theme events, but this was ours. The two dozen or so kids on board were everywhere at once, outfitted in pirate hats and scarves and stuffed parrots. Three distinct groups were battling one another with plastic truncheons and rubber swords and all manner of semilethal weapons on loan from the ship’s festive supply. Even the adults were in the swing of it, at least some of them, with plastic hooks and wooden legs and tankards of ale. A handful of wench-style blouses were being paraded around on female bodies that should have known better.

Thirteen-year-old Gifford Gilchrist was keeping busy chasing his sandy-haired girlfriend up the stairs and around a lifeboat, singing a made-up song about booty and pillage. “Giff, be careful,” his father warned, which might have sounded more convincing coming from a man without a wooden leg and an eye patch covering half of his pair of bifocals.

“Why pirates?” Monk asked. He had located a spot away from the action and magically had already found his orange vest and put it on.

“San Marcos has a history as a pirate port,” I informed him. “At least, that’s the pretext for all the fun. Everyone loves a pirate.”

“I don’t.”

“Well, I do. They’re sexy.”

“Of course,” Monk said. “And what’s your favorite part of pirate life? I’d like to know. The murder, the torture, the rape, the kidnapping, thievery, destruction of property, cutting off of limbs, defiance of maritime law . . . ? I could keep on going.”

“Be my guest.”

“Pillaging towns, bad personal hygiene, promotion of violent behavior, sinking of ships, animal cruelty, setting a bad example for the youth of today, pirate booty . . . I could keep on going.”

“Be my guest.”

“The bad music played on concertinas, cheating at cards, lack of medical care or a retirement program. I suppose I already said murder. General sadism, sodomy, bad food, scary flags . . .”

I was fascinated to see how many more he could invent. But we were interrupted.

“I heard about Mr. Leeds.” It was First Officer Lao. His only concession to pirate fashion was a red kerchief tied around the neck of his starched uniform. “What exactly happened?”

We found an empty game room on the lounge deck and told him almost everything we knew.

“It’s like this ship is cursed,” Lao said. “I don’t know how we’re going to survive.”

“I’m going to need to examine Leeds’ body,” Monk told him. “Tonight’s good.”

“Whatever you need,” said Lao. “I’ll let the doctor know.”

“Any more acts of vandalism?” Monk asked. “Not that I expect any.”

“Actually . . .” Officer Lao hesitated, then shook his head. “No, it’s hardly vandalism, but . . .”

“What?” said Monk. “If it’s anything out of the ordinary . . .”

“It sounds petty, I know. But”—Lao laughed—“there’s a wooden leg missing.” I don’t know what I’d been expecting him to say, but it wasn’t this. “You know, one of those legs you strap on. Part of a costume.”

It seems the pirate-night props and costumes had all been stored in a waterproof bin on the Calypso deck. Teddy, during the last cruise, while he was still assistant cruise director, had been in charge of putting things away. He was very organized about it, with every returnable hook and leg and feathered pirate hat checked off against a list.

Lao continued. “When Teddy opened the bin this afternoon to get ready, there was one wooden leg missing. That’s all.”

Monk was instantly intrigued. “A leg went missing between your last pirate night and this one? And the bin was locked?”

“Teddy probably miscounted last week, although he swears he didn’t.” Lao fidgeted. “I told you it wasn’t anything.”

“Does Captain Sheffield have a key to the pirate bin?” asked Monk.

“The captain has keys to everything.”

Monk thought for a second, then left the game room for the lounge. He stood by the wall and waylaid the first wooden-legged pirate to stumble by. It turned out to be Barry Gilchrist, father of my thirteen-year-old nemesis. “Sorry,” said Monk. “Can I see your leg?”

“You can have it,” said Barry and sat down on a planter to take it off. “It’s not terrible when you’re just standing, but when you’re actually trying to get somewhere . . . Has anyone seen Giff?” The last time I’d seen Gifford, he’d been chasing a girl, singing about booty and pillage.

I accepted his wooden leg and watched Barry walk off unsteadily, trying to revive his sleepy real leg, which had been tied back up around his hamstring.

Monk held the leg in a pair of wipes and examined its length and heft. Then he held it like a baseball bat and took a swing. I could tell exactly where he was going.

“Adrian?” I took out my iPhone and scrolled down to the pictures I’d taken yesterday in Dr. Aaglan’s examining room. I pulled up the one of the wound on Mariah’s left temple, enlarged it, and held it up next to the wooden leg. You could see where the wound narrowed slightly, like the narrowing of the artificial leg.

“There’s your missing leg,” I announced.

Monk nodded. “It must have taken some thought, given the confines of a boat. The man needed a blunt instrument that could mimic the impact of hitting your head on a wooden railing. And it had to be something he could throw overboard without it being missed.”

“You’re saying the captain killed Mariah with a wooden leg?”

“Another reason to hate pirates,” Monk pointed out.

“So what do we do?” said Lao. “It’s not like this proves anything.”

“If we had the actual leg, we could check DNA—the smallest amounts of skin, blood, maybe even prints. Wood is a good medium.” I was showing off my newfound forensic skills.

“But you say he threw it overboard,” said Lao. “So we’ve got nothing.”

“We’ve got nothing,” Monk echoed. “Except now I know the murder weapon.”

“And you know how he rang the alarm,” I said, “which you’re not telling me.”

“Because you’re smart enough to figure it out on your own, aren’t you, Natalie?”

“Hold on,” interrupted Lao. “You figured out how he rang the alarm?”

“Don’t ask,” I said, shaking my head. “Mr. Houdini here will tell us when he’s good and ready.”

Monk rolled his shoulders in agreement. “What I don’t know is how Sheffield pushed the body overboard without being there.”

“But you’re going to find out,” Lao said.

“He always finds out,” I said.

“Good.” Lao looked relieved. “If there’s anything more I can do, just ask.”

“As a matter of fact, Natalie needs a room.”

I had told Monk about my expulsion by the Bulgarian party girls, but I never expected him to actually be concerned. It was kind of touching. “Thanks, Adrian. But they don’t have any free cabins.”

“Sure, they do. One just opened up. He can get you the key for Malcolm Leeds’ room.”

“What?” How he could even think . . . “I can’t use a dead person’s room.”

“You’re already using a dead person’s room,” Monk said.

“It’s not the same,” I argued. “Mariah was already my roommate when she died.”

“Hold on.” Lao turned to me. “You’re staying in the crew quarters? You can’t do that.”

“You see, Natalie. You can’t do that. What made you think you could do that?”

•   •   •

You’re probably wondering how it could be any worse, sleeping in Malcolm’s room instead of Mariah’s. Well, you’re going to have to take my word. Maybe it was the fact that I had started developing feelings for Malcolm and didn’t want to have to face the reality of his abandoned room. Or maybe it was a cumulative thing. You take over one dead person’s room and it’s okay. You do it twice and it starts to seem like a ghoulish pattern.

Two more days, I told myself as I unpacked in cabin 562, just down the hall from my original digs. I couldn’t decide if two more days was good or bad. Probably bad, since it meant we would either have to solve everything by then or see the murder scene and our suspect sail away.

Pushing aside a suit, a jacket, and a few shirts and pairs of slacks, I found room enough in Malcolm’s closet for my skirts and blouses. Both sets of drawers were already full, and I didn’t have the energy to try to make space. So I left the rest of my things in my opened bags lying on one of the beds. I took the other, hoping it was not the same bed he’d slept in the previous night.

The bathroom was easier. Malcolm’s things were organized neatly on one shelf, leaving the other for me. I was mildly impressed that, in this day and age, any human being could take up only one shelf in a bathroom.

I stood there, staring at his shelf and my shelf, while a thought slowly dawned in my addled but still functioning brain.

Oh my God.
I needed to find Monk.

I found him in Dr. Aaglan’s office. The doctor was gone for the day, leaving Monk bending down over the tall, lean body lying on the examining table. It was the first time I’d seen Malcolm naked, and it was pretty much what I had expected to see, except for the dead part.

“He was a jogger,” said Monk without looking up. “He played the piano and traveled a fair amount. He lived alone but had been married at one point. He’s an Aries, not that he was a believer in that stuff, but his sister is.”

I didn’t ask him how he knew. “Why is any of this important?”

“It’s not. I just like to stay in practice.”

“Malcolm took his toothbrush,” I said. “It wasn’t in his bathroom.”

“What?” Monk’s head went up, like a gopher springing out of a hole. “Are you sure?” He didn’t wait for my reply. “So that’s why he was near the bus terminal.”

“Exactly. Malcolm wasn’t planning to return to the ship. I assume this pulls us up from sixty-four percent?”

“What are the chances that someone abandons ship and gets accidentally killed? This puts the murder possibility close to ninety. Eighty-nine percent, to be exact.”

“What happened to his messenger bag? That might tell us something.” The last time I’d seen the bag, it was lying on the cobblestones of San Marcos, not far from his body. “I’ll call Captain Alameda,” I said. “It could still be at the hospital or the police station.”

“It’s not,” Monk said. “It’s gone. Stolen, either by his killer or a bystander.”

I had the same feeling but still intended to make the call.

Monk had moved away from the body and crossed to a black plastic bag filled with the deceased’s possessions from the accident—his sandals and underwear and sunglasses. Some loose pesos from his pocket. No wallet or passport; they’d either been in his bag or had been stolen separately. Even Monk would have a hard time finding anything here.

“The deceased was slightly bowlegged. He wasn’t usually forgetful, but had been distracted a lot lately. He liked expensive things. . . .”

“Still practicing?” I asked.

“I like practicing. But you do need to call Lieutenant Devlin, as ASAP as possible. Fill her in on what’s going down. Ask about the London connection. Oh, and one more thing . . .”

A minute later, I gladly left Monk with the body and made my way up to the lounge deck. The ship was once again at sea and our cell phones were useless. But the satellite phones in the business center would work perfectly, and they would be free, according to my arrangement with Captain Sheffield. I swiped my ship pass on one of the phones and started dialing.

“Amy?” It was after working hours and I was calling her at home, so I went with
Amy
. “Hope I’m not interrupting.”

“Teeger? This better be good. I’ve had a long day, and I’m just sitting down with a glass of wine.”

I had no sympathy. None. “Malcolm Leeds was hit by a car and killed.”

I could hear her voice switch instantly into professional mode. “Was it an accident?”

I told Devlin everything I knew, which was probably less than Monk knew at the moment. “Did you get a chance to contact London about the fake Shakespeare?”

“It’s only been a few hours,” Devlin snapped. “And they’re eight hours ahead of us. But we made some progress. Interpol found a book restorer who says he made two copies for an American museum. A courier picked them up last week, he says. We’re waiting for more details.”

“So Monk was right—about London and the two copies.”

“It seems so, although that shouldn’t surprise us, should it?” Devlin paused, and I thought I could hear her take a sip of wine. “Does Monk think the Leeds death is connected to the Melrose case?”

“It’s certainly possible,” I said, which led me to my next question. “Did you locate Portia Braun? I know it’s only been a few hours.”

“Yes, we did,” Devlin said. “Ms. Braun is old school chums with a German history professor at Holy Names in Oakland. Gretchen something-or-other. After we released Ms. Braun, she went to stay with Gretchen in her apartment in the Mission District. We tracked her down through Facebook. Braun posted a photo of the two of them last night.”